Detroit's Three Casinos Make $360M So Far In 2017 ... But One Got The Lion's Share

(WWJ) Does this mean the economy's on the rebound? Revenue reports from the month of March have MGM Grand, MotorCity and Greektown making a combined $131 million -- a 5 percent increase from the same time last year.

For the first quarter of the year, the casinos had a reported total revenue of $360 million.

MGM Grand had the lion's share, followed by MotorCity and Greektown.

Overall in 2016, the three Detroit casinos' revenue rose a slight 0.7 percent to $1.386 billion.

And it turns out Detroiters love their automated gambling machines more than games of chance: Slots contributed $1.13 billion, or 82 percent, of annual revenue, and table games brought in $256 million, or 18 percent.

Full-year revenue for MGM was up 1.7 percent to $592.1 million. MotorCity revenue rose 0.7 percent to $467.9 million. Greektown revenue, at $325.6 million, was 1.3 percent below 2015 totals.

For the year ending December 2016, the three Detroit casinos paid the state of Michigan $112.2 million in gaming taxes compared with $111.5 million in 2015, according to a state report.  The casinos also reported paying $175.5 million in wagering taxes and development agreement payments to the city of Detroit during 2016.

Full-year market shares in 2016 were:

• MGM, 43 percent
• MotorCity, 34 percent
• Greektown, 23 percent

In the last month of the year, the casinos were facing a downward trend, with December 2016 revenue falling 6.8 percent below December 2015.

But they obviously rebounded in the new year.